Preceding a rocky few weeks on Capitol Hill, Brett Kavanaugh was recently officially confirmed as Associate Justice of the Supreme Court. It was a disappointing defeat for Democrats, but the most discouraging of events came in the form of Senator Susan Collins.
Despite listening to the emotional and groundbreaking testimony of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, and the hundreds of protestors, feminists, and American citizens alike that crowded the hallways of the Senate building, Collins made the heartbreaking decision to confirm Kavanaugh’s seat on the Supreme Court. Collins, a moderate Republican woman representing her home state of Maine, not only voted in favor of an alleged sexual abuser, but made the calculated choice to vote against women nationwide.
As a self-identified moderate Republican, it’s clear that the country expected more from Collins. Her political career is lengthy and, admittedly so, quite revolutionary – she’s maintained her position since 1996, has never missed a single Senate vote, and is a highly intelligent and impressive woman. Even as a lifelong Republican, Collins refused to endorse Trump’s presidency campaign and condemned his temporary travel ban in 2017. She’s not the worst person to have a seat at the Senate.
Collins is frequently placed in a position where her vote is ‘do or die,’ and this situation was no exception. Her decision was the pivotal vote in the Kavanaugh case, and when it came down to the wire, the outcome was painful. She voted yes to Kavanaugh, yet the words that left her mouth that day seemed to push women back by centuries.
Collins made it obvious that she did not care for the suffering of her fellow women, nor did it matter that Ford, among the other accusers in her company, had strong cases against Kavanaugh from the very beginning. She did not care about the ethics of having an alleged rapist in the Supreme Court. She did not care that, now that she’s allowed this man to make laws and decisions on behalf of the entire country, women, minorities, members of the LGBTQ+ community, and so on fear for their rights now more than ever.
Collins could care less about the women of this country. Her vote was nothing beyond a self-sabotaging, selfish act of greed and for that, I hope she’s happy.